Alright, this is the start of a book that I came up with a few months ago. I've had writer's block a few times, so I haven't gotten very far, but....yeah..... Well, I hope you'll take the time to read it and give me some feedback on it.

The Broken Woodland
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As he walks home in the heat of summer, he stops and stares at the blissful peace of the nearby lake. Since he has nowhere else to go, he decides to go for a walk around the lake and take in the calm of the clearing.
While slowly walking around the lake, he notices the fish swimming near him, as if waiting for a snack. He throws in a bit of bread that he brought with him for just this purpose. He sits down in his usual spot on the far side of the lake and watches the sky admiring how utterly peaceful his home is.
He decides to finally go home after staying at the lakeside for about an hour and a half. As he walks down the beaten trail that leads to his home, he notices movement a bit deeper into the forest to his right. He decides to not check it out and just keep on his way, but keep his bow ready in case something happens. He strings his bow, and keeps walking along with his bow and an arrow hanging loosely at his side.
When his house finally comes into view, he is attacked from behind by a monster that he has never before seen in these woods. He nimbly dodges its first slash of claws then quickly hops onto the branch of a nearby tree and nocks an arrow, waiting for the beast to turn its hulking form around. When the beast finally turns around, he lets the arrow fly and it strikes the beast directly in the eye. The beast replies with a horrendous cry that sounds like thunder.
The beast then charges at him and jumps. Just barely jumping from the tree in time, he fires another arrow into the beast’s back left foot. The beast does not seem to even notice the arrow, which would have crippled any other animal in the forest. Shocked by this find, he nocks two more arrows and fires them haphazardly at the monster, because the monster did not let up on its relentless attack.
He misses a step, and the monster takes advantage of that dreadful mishap, raking its claws along his torso. As blood leaks from his wound, he jumps up to a treetop in hops of two things, gaining a better perspective, and safely being able to fire arrows at the beast without fear of missing another step. To his horror the monster rams the tree that he is standing on, and succeeds in toppling it. As the tree falls, he fires two arrows then jumps off it onto the ground.
The beast, perhaps being hit in a vital point, or because of loss of fluids, collapses. He goes to check whether the beast is dead or not by stabbing the beast’s other eye with his dagger. As the dagger is plunged into the beast’s eye, it lets out a death cry and falls completely limp. Seeing that the beast’s hide was tougher than leather, he decides to drag it home and take its hide to the armorer the next morning to be fashioned into armor for the town watch.
He was not worried about retribution from any of its nearby kin, because it attacked alone and was not a native animal to this forest. As he is dragging the beast’s lifeless corpse to his home, which is farther removed from the rest of the town than any of the other houses, he hears a birdsong of a nearby nightingale. Not realizing that he had been away from his home for so long he starts hurrying back. But the beast was too heavy for him to go much faster than he was already going, so he decided to pace himself, not wanting to be halfway back and out of breath.
He got back just before dark, and just in time, because the wolves had started coming from their dens and he could hear them howling from deep within the forest. He took the beast in his house to keep it from the predators who would take it as an easy meal. He decided to let the armorer do what had to be done to the beast, because he did not have the proper tools to do so at his home.
Feeling hungry, he went into his cupboard and took out a handful of nuts, a peach, grapes, and an apple. He sliced up the apple and peach and threw the slices into a bowl with the nuts. He poured a pitcher of cold water into the bowl to allow the flavor of the fruit mix in with the flavor of the nuts. All the while, he ate the grapes to stave away the worst of the hunger. When the mix had sat there long enough for the flavor to be near perfection, he drained the water into a glass for his drink and began eating his dinner.
After he had finished, he decided to write down what had happened that day in his journal he had kept since he was a boy and his father had abandoned him, which was over thirty-five years before, when his mother was killed by a pack of what he remembered were called Hybor. He did not remember what those animals looked like though, for he had been very young at the time. After being abandoned, he was raised communally, cared for by everyone and no one. It was because they felt they had to help this poor lost child that they took care of him so he never really felt as though he had friends or family his entire life.
After finishing that day’s entry, he went to sleep, or tried to. As he had just put on his shift, he heard a knock at his door, which was extremely unusual because he did not have many friends and because hardly anyone went out at this time of night for fear of the wolves who hunted in packs of twenty or larger. He answered the door, only to find the town elder at his doorstep surrounded by three of the town’s best warriors.
“Yes, what can I do for you oh gracious elder?” Sajvad asked with obvious sarcasm in his voice.
“Do not mock him ungrateful one!” The warrior, Tasheno, said to Sajvad. “Or else you will not have a tongue to mock with!”
“Now, now,” said the Elder, Kai-Ei, while acting patient as usual. “There is no need to threaten him with such a harsh punishment for just saying what is on his mind.”
“Well then, Kai-Ei, you must have come here for a very important reason if it is this late at night.” Sajvad said without the previous sarcastic bite to his tone.
“Indeed I did Sajvad. There have been sightings of a fairly dangerous beast in the forest lately and when we heard the tree not too far from your home fall, we feared that you had fallen prey to it.”
“Well, thank you for your concern, but as you can see I’m alright. Just a few scratches that were easily bandaged.”
“Then it IS true, you were attacked by something, yes?” said another of the warriors, Falen.
“Unfortunately, yes, I was. I brought the beast back here in hopes of taking it to the armorer tomorrow to make its hide into armor for the watch. Its hide was much tougher than any other animal I have encountered in the forest. In fact, it took me seven arrows and a stab with my dagger to kill the beast.” Sajvad said dishearteningly because four of the arrows broke and he had to fletch more of them the next morning.
“Take us to the beast’s carcass, we must see if it is what we fear that it may be.” Kai-Ei said, so seriously that Sajvad knew something was going on that they were not telling him about.
“Well, I see no harm in doing so, let me take you to it. Come in, please.” Sajvad said politely.
Sajvad took them through his home until they reached the storage area of his house. When they saw the beast’s carcass, they all took a step backward except for Sajvad, who had been attacked by the wicked thing.
“Isn’t that a…?” The last warrior, Ketlan, said.
“Yes, it is. It is a Hybor.” Kai-Ei said gravely.
This statement took Sajvad aback. “Y...You…You mean…. This is one of the monsters that took my parent’s lives?!” Sajvad exclaimed while nearly falling backward in surprise.
Kei-Ei wasn’t surprised in the least to see Sajvad’s reaction to this new information, instead Kai-Ei comforted him. “You did very well to have taken down a single one of these beasts alone, they almost never feel pain, and have almost unending endurance.”
Sajvad was till too shocked for words as he took in this incredible information. “So…. So does that mean…there will be more of these beasts here soon? I mean, you said a PACK took out my parents when I was a child.” Sajvad’s expression was that of complete terror at the thought.
“Unfortunately, we think so, we haven’t been able to learn about the Hybor since they have only been here once or twice before. But those few times, they did come in packs.” Tasheno said to Sajvad, respecting the emotions running through Sajvad at this information.
Falen said, “These will be extremely troubled times if the Hybor are coming back. It seems that they are not only dangerous in, and of, themselves, but are also bad omens, for each time they have come, horrible things have happened in the forest.”
“This should be taken from here immediately, so as if more Hybors are around, they won’t follow the scent of their fallen comrade to your home.” Kai-Ei turned from the Hybor to Sajvad, “We will take this from here as soon as we are able, which will be when we leave for the main part of town tonight.”
Sajvad, still in a supreme state of shock, was frozen in place and could hardly nod his acquiescence.
As they left, Sajvad sunk to the floor, shaking with a kind of fear he had never known before, hoping that Nature would spare him from the same death that his parents had experienced years before. As he thought this, he realized just how much of a coward he was and felt truly ashamed of himself.


well, this is about as far as I've gotten....the end of chapter two. I have chapter three's title...but thats about it..... I would like any criticism you have about my work, mainly because I'm never very confident of my work and I would like to make it better.

oh, and, yes, I do realize that the entire first chapter I refer to my character as "he". the reason I did that is to excentuate(sp?) the chapter title.